Wednesday, 30 April 2008

Ontario is Canada's most populace province. Home to the city of Toronto, Ontario has been known as Canada's economic engine. It also receives the bulk of immigrants to Canada. Now, the province is on the verge of becoming a "have not" province. How the times change. You can read about it here at the Toronto Star.

A new report from Toronto-Dominion Bank yesterday warned that Ontario is on track to receive federal equalization payments for the first time.

The reasons?

A high dollar and a U.S. economic slowdown are hurting Ontario's export industries – witness 1,500 layoffs at General Motors in Oshawa and Campbell's in Listowel this week – while soaring oil and commodity revenues in western provinces make Ontario seem poor by comparison.

"Ontario is not the mighty king of the economy any more," said TD's chief economist, Don Drummond, predicting the province could get $400 million in 2010 and $1.3 billion the following year.

"It's one of the weaker partners, but again it's not so much Ontario's being weak as the other provinces are really roaring along."

[...]

But Ontario taxpayers would still be paying billions more into federal coffers than they get back from Ottawa for equalization, health and social programs, Drummond's report said.

[...]

The latest figures available show that in 2005, Ontario taxpayers sent $21 billion more to Ottawa in taxes than the federal government spent in the province.

That's proof the equalization formula – since 2007 based on a complex mix of economic data from 10 provinces, up from five previously – is "flawed" and in need of repair, said Finance Minister Dwight Duncan.

I don't know how truthful that TD bank report is. The report writers may in fact be angling for some kind business in the form of economic stimulus packages by which TD will be right there to help, interest rates and all. Whatever the case may be, Ontario workers are hurting. How does mass immigration help them? They might not have a job but at least they have all that cultural diversity to cheer them up.

It's almost as easy to predict the economy as it is the weather. In times like these we need to make snap decisions that are in the best interests of Canadians and reducing Canada's immigrant intake is one such decision irrespective of intended immigration goals. Canada should reduce its immigration targets in the current economic environment because it is the right thing to do and tying immigration targets to the economic health of the country is the sane thing to do. Continuing to import a labour force when many Canadians are finding themselves out of work is unjust. Immigration should not trample on the birth rights of Canadians.

The following is another environmental story illustrating how Canada is sacrificing its natural diversity for the sake of cultural diversity. It's from the Toronto Star so you can bet that the article will avoid discussing the root of the threat to the Holland Marsh which is mass immigration. You can read it in full here.

There are several important growing areas for Toronto's food. Most are in Latin America. But closer to home, we have the Niagara region, Prince Edward County, southwestern Ontario (roughly from Guelph to Windsor) and, closest of all, Holland Marsh, just 50 kilometres north of Toronto.

Mary Ruth McDonald, associate professor at the University of Guelph's department of plant agriculture, says the marsh is an extremely important area for vegetables, the source of 40 per cent of the nation's onions and carrots, 25 per cent of the celery and almost all of Toronto's locally produced Asian greens.

McDonald says the area produces an estimated $50 million worth of vegetables a year. Not bad for 22,000 acres with a short growing season. The relatively small area is so bountiful because of a condition which, admittedly, doesn't sound terribly promising – muck soil. This super soil is left over from the marsh that was once there and is now drained.

[...]

First on many local residents' minds is the wild, unchecked development in Newmarket, Bradford and Schomberg. Holland Landing is right in the middle of this burgeoning area and while the marsh itself is protected from development, nearby construction is a concern.

Much of the "unchecked development", in fact I'd say a lot, is driven to meet the needs of mass immigration. As the latest census reveals many immigrants are moving into the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), the area just outside of Toronto which includes Newmarket. Also, mass immigration has contributed to rising housing prices in Toronto forcing many to leave the city to find accommodation. If it weren't for mass immigration fueled rapid population then the Holland Marsh may not be facing the threat of development, at least not this soon.

Farmers also have been burdened with silt and debris in drainage canals from construction projects – many for the development of nearby bedroom communities. Of late, they have finally been given financial help to clean the canals and assurances of strict silt mats and fences. But now the concern is shifting from construction debris to the runoff from residents. According to Art Janse, former drainage superintendent commissioner of Bradford-West Gwillimbury, each new house is responsible for six times the amount of runoff that would occur naturally, which could exacerbate existing flood hazards.

Every environmentalist in this country should be an immigration reformer. We need to pressure the government to reduce Canada's immigration targets. If you continue to remain silent on the issue the you might as well enjoy the Holland Marsh while it lasts.

To show you the extent to which urban sprawl has reached the Mash, start a journey at the southern most end of Bathurst Street. This will be located in the city of Toronto near the north shore of Lake Ontario. If you travel northward you will encounter development, be it business or residential or both, all the way to Highway 9 which runs east and west. Travelling a short distance east on highway 9 will take you right into the heart of Newmarket. Travelling a short distance west will take you to the Marsh. Now tell me that mass immigration has nothing to do with this development.

On a similar note this article is typical of the Schizophrenic character of the Toronto Star and I'd say the left in general. On the one hand, the paper champions green initiatives and the preservation of the environment by publishing such articles as the one I just blogged about. On the other, it chastised Ontario Environment Commissioner Gord Miller for saying the same thing only he commited the unpardoable sin by accussing rapid population growth - and thus mass immigration by implication - for being at the source of the threat. If the heads of the editors at the Star weren't screwed on...

OTTAWA–Unless "urgent" action is taken to tackle "systemic" problems, Canada's backlog of immigration applications could grow to 1.5 million by 2012, up from 925,000 now, and newcomers will face a 10-year wait, Immigration Minister Diane Finley told a Commons committee yesterday.

"The current system, if left unchanged, is on track to collapse under its own weight. The system needs fixing," Finley said.

"We are facing real and serious international competition for the talents and skills that we need to fill," she said, calling for a "renewed" vision for the immigration system.

Competition for what skills and talents? I wish they would be more specific because according to StatsCan retail salesperson tops the list of jobs for both genders. I blogged about it and you can read about it here. Also, Immigration Watch Canada brings to our attention that the alleged "best and brightest" are actually just the average, fair, or "so so". You can read it here.

Changes to the immigration act would give Finley the power to issue "instructions" to her department to give priority to categories of immigrants whose job skills are in demand in Canada. At the same time, she would have the power to refuse applications in other categories.

[...]

The problem is current rules require the department to process every application – in the order they were received, she said. Finley likened it to a hockey team able to pick only the first 25 people who applied for a position, even if that choice left the team without a goalie.

The current problem is that Canada accepts too many immigrants to begin with especially those from the family class. The immigration system would be more effective if Canada dramatically reduced its immigrant intake number and only those who would serve the real economic needs of the country should be allowed to immigrate. Not the aged parents or grandparents or an unskilled uncle or nephew who, under the current system, would be given attention over more suitable immigrants just for being ahead in the queue. It's not right.

The Toronto region could spend billions a year on public transit and still not reach provincial targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

That startling conclusion emerged yesterday with the latest work from Metrolinx, the region's transportation planning agency.

It's not a startling conclusion, in fact it is a predictable conclusion given Canada's mass immigration system.

That's because the influx of 2.6 million people into the region by 2031 comes with a corresponding number of cars on the road.

The most ambitious car-reduction scenario Metrolinx tested includes $419 billion in transit improvements that would cost $3.8 billion annually to operate. But even under that proposal, greenhouse gas emissions could still climb 18 per cent over 2006 levels or, at best, decline by just 4 per cent.

Queen's Park, by contrast, has pledged an emissions decrease of 6 per cent below 1990 levels by 2014 and a 15 per cent reduction by 2020.

The root of the problem is mass immigration. Where is the bulk of the influx of 2.6 million people into the region going to come from? If Canada's environmentalists used that half a brain they collectively share they would address immigration as a threat to the environment yet they don't. According to this report, if we implemented all the green saving polices put forward we would still be a square one since the influx of people would reverse any gains made.

This isn't the first time population increase was linked to environmental erosion and the attendant decrease in quality of life. Gord Miller, Environmental Commissioner of Ontario, made a similar statement in 2007 with this report called "Reconciling Our Priorities".

In states:

The Southern Ontario sustainability analysis first focuses on the Greater Golden Horseshoe Growth Plan (GGH Plan) and considers how appropriate the projected growth is, relative to the carrying capacity of the landscape ecosystem to accommodate that growth. It concludes that the planning system of the province puts the cart before the horse. Population projections imposed on some communities for economic growth reasons exceed the available local water supply and the natural limits of the rivers to receive and assimilate the treated sewage.

Laudably, the Growth Plan seeks to improve the density of future development andimprove transit opportunities in the growth areas. But, the targets are too weak. Where the target densities have already been achieved in past development, we have not seen a substantial move away from an automobile based lifestyle. Without a change in the carbased culture, we are going to see a million more cars trying to use the roads of the Greater Golden Horseshoe, and these will only spawn more congestion, more pollution and the unceasing demand for more roads, which will consume even more of the limited green space remaining on this crowded landscape.

Canada is known the world over for its natural beauty. It is part of the Canadian identity and this nation's natural heritage yet we are sacrificing it to favour immigration for immigration's sake.

If you truly care about the environment then you will pressure the government to reduce immigration numbers. We owe it to ourselves and to future generations of Canadians. I cannot take any environmentalist seriously whodoesn't. We have seen ecological disasters occur in over populated areas of the world. Why replicate that here?

Last week, the government launched an advertising campaign that promises the proposed changes will create an immigration system that is "flexible, fast and fair for everyone." The print and radio ads, which are being funded by public coffers, will run for the next few weeks in ethnic-media outlets. The ads have cost about $60,000 so far, but the immigration department could not say what the final tab will be.

The vast majority of Canadians outside of immigrant and ethnic communities have no clue as to what the reforms to the immigration act are all about and I doubt they even care. But they should care about immigration because it is changing this country in fundamental ways and some of their concerns - such as increasing traffic congestion, rising housing prices, threats to farmlands and green spaces, job prospects, etc. - have an immigration component to it one way or another.

The fact that ethnic media outlets are being targeted shows how Canada's immigration policy has been wrestled away from Canadians and surrendered to the hands of immigrant groups and those who make their livings serving them. This is unfair and undemocratic because immigration affects all Canadians. If immigration policy cannot be hammered out without the blessing of immigrant groups then effectively immigrant and ethnic groups, a minority of the population, are writing it. The conflict of interest is apparent and Canada has lost control of its borders and its sovereignty. Since immigration is the introduction of a foreign people into a host society then immigration is a sovereignty issue.

Government officials say the campaign is designed to clear up misunderstandings about the bill, which gives the immigration minister more power to fast track the applications of certain types of immigrants. The government says that will help reduce the backlog, which has reached 925,000 applications, while making the immigration system more responsive to labour-market needs.

[...]

Senior Conservatives say they never expected immigration to be an election trigger when the party took power more than two years ago. But that could very well happen. The Conservatives have rolled the immigration bill into the broader budget-implementation bill, which is automatically considered a matter of confidence in the government.

[...]

The NDP and the Bloc Quebecois oppose the bill. The Liberals have trashed it as anti-immigrant, but have stopped short of voting it down in the House of Commons.

But Liberal MPs are coming under increasing pressure from some ethnic groups to oppose the bill. Last week, a coalition that includes the Chinese Canadian National Council and the Canadian Arab Federation staged a demonstration at the Toronto constituency office of Liberal MP Bob Rae. The coalition is threatening not to vote Liberal if the party doesn't oppose the bill.

Not vote Liberal? Yeah right!!! I like this quote from this anonymous senior Conservative source.

"We believe that it's going to be vicious trench warfare, and the vast majority of the native-born Canadian population will be completely oblivious to it, because this vicious trench warfare will play itself out at the doorstep and in the ethnic media," said a senior Conservative source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

He's right. The vast majority, at some 80%, don't know what is going on. This is all being played out in the House of Commons and in the ethnic news media. It is the concerns of ethnic and immigrant groups that are relevant and they are being informed and updated on the issue. In a way this is a form of closed door politics where the concerns of most Canadians are being marginalized or treated with indifference. This is undemocratic and is illustrative of how powerful ethnic politics has become in Ottawa where a foreign people are writing policy and can influence party decisions to the point of calling a general election when most Canadians, those of the host population, don't want one.

If the government is defeated and a general election is called it is because immigrant groups wanted it, not out of a loyalty to Canada but out of a commitment to their people living in foreign countries. I think there is some racism at the root of this because we Canadians are "the other" to them and that needs to be offset. Canada is also too white and we all know that is a bad thing that needs to be remedied. But the question that comes to mind is whose country is this anyways?

Friday, 25 April 2008

Why do you think that is? It's probably because we're a nation of xenophobes and racists right? If that's what you think then you probably live in Toronto. You can read the article in full here at the Toronto Star.

More than half of Canadians are opposed to recruiting temporary workers overseas to help ease Canada's labour shortage, says a national poll released yesterday.

The Angus Reid poll for the Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada, a Vancouver-based think-tank on Asia, also found the majority of Canadians continue to welcome immigrants from Asia, though the goodwill has been waning, especially in Quebec, where support for Asian immigration has plummeted from 83 per cent a year ago to 44 per cent today.

What a difference a year makes. The vast majority of immigrants to Canada come from the Asian continent, revealing any claims of diversity and multiculturalism to be a farce. Recent census data reveals that half of Canada's visible minorities are either South Asian (India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh) or Chinese. You can see the reality of this fact just by walking the streets of Toronto or Vancouver. In these cities multiculturalism means South Asian and Chinese with a few countries thrown in for good measure. It's a joke but it came to be this way because of political decisions to give India and China favoured nation status when it comes to immigration. There is no real reason for Canada to be accepting so many immigrants from just two countries if we remove the political motive from the equation. Read here and here for more on this.

Of all the provinces, support for the federal government's temporary foreign worker program was highest in Alberta (58 per cent), Manitoba/Saskatchewan (55 per cent) and British Columbia (49 per cent).

However, in Ontario and Quebec, where people have been affected by a recent economic downturn and job losses, only 39 per cent of people were in favour of the program. Nationally, only 44 per cent supported the temporary worker program.

Ontario also receives the lion's share of immigrants and I can assure you many Ontarians are displeased with the demographic changes occurring in their province. Canadians are not leaving Toronto to escape inflated housing prices alone.

Funny, after all the decades of the propaganda Canadians have been forced fed by their moral and intellectual superiors on the left, extolling the virtues of mass immigration and multiculturalism, here is another poll suggesting Canadians just aren't buying it. It's because the elites in the mass media are out of touch with the average Canadian and they just don't get it. It's also because most Canadians are sensible and patriotic when it comes to jobs. They see no sense in brining in foreign workers that Canadian can be trained for. As I wrote below, Canada is the most educated country in the industrialized world. Canada is home to a greater proportion of college educated and university educated workers than the United States, Germany, and Japan. In other words Canada already has a skilled labour force that is ready to be retrained to fill existing job shortages.

The problem is that the business community is unwilling to train and retain workers, opting instead to offload such an investment onto the individual. Since that is the case the labour force has developed a mercenary character to it where employees feel no attachment or loyalty to their employer and are always on the look out for a better offer and will jump ship when he or she finds it. Thus, not only has the business community helped create the alleged skills shortage they also have a problem of holding onto these employees. The business community only has itself to blame. But what's more accurate it that the business community is in desperate need of cheap labour and Canadians are too expensive. Read here, here, here, and here for more on this.

Read here, here, here and here for more on how mass immigration and the scarcity of good paying jobs is creating poverty in this country.

We're the most educated country on earth when it comes to college and university, says the latest census – yet we face a crisis of jobs we can't fill.

A summit of 350 business leaders and educators warned yesterday that unless Canada starts training more people in skilled trades – from welding to drywalling – Ontario could face one-third of a million unfilled jobs by 2025 as baby boomers retire.

[...]

The latest census data shows that Canada stands first in the developed world in the proportion of people who hold credentials from either college or university – 48 per cent, compared with 39 per cent in the U.S. or 32 per cent in Australia.

We can add Japan and Germany to that list as well.

Armed with that knowledge it now becomes clearer as to why immigrants with advanced degrees are driving cabs and delivering pizza. Canada didn't need them and now, because of our poor immigration policy, the Canadian labour market is being flooded with university and college educated workers. And not only has the immigrant made a bad career move by immigrating to Canada but the lives of many Canadians were either put on hold or diminished because of this glut of advance degrees. This is how Canada's immigration system is ruining lives.

In any event we are still being sold the line that Canada will suffer a labour shortage as baby boomers retire. Therefore, Canada needs more immigrants if any job growth is to be realized. Well, what kinds of jobs are they talking about?

For starters, the construction trades is one such area but what is our immigration system doing to address this? India and China top the list of source countries of immigrants to Canada yet you rarely see an Asian working in any skilled trade. So why do India and China still retain favour nation status when they are not producing the immigrants this country needs?

We must keep in mind the cyclical nature of construction work. Housing starts are down across the country. And when the boomers retire they will be on a fixed income. Can we expect them to engage in home reno projects on such a limited cash flow in their advanced age? It may very well be that we will not need as many skilled tradespeople in the future and we may in fact be creating another labour glut.

School enrollment is down in Ontario and there is talk of closing schools in the province. A moratorium on hiring new teachers has been called as there are too many teacher's college graduates looking for full time teaching positions, putting the careers of many Canadians on hold or at jeopardy. How does immigration help this?

So what skills shortage are they talking about? Beats me, but here is a list of the top jobs in Canada as reported by StatsCan for the year 2006.

Notice how Retail Salesperson tops the list for both men and women and it is this and related jobs that businesses are in need of workers. Not engineers or IT specialists. It seems to me there is no real skills shortage. It's a lie, a con to convince Canadians to accept an immigration system they otherwise oppose. If there is a skills shortage of any kind it is a need for real cheap labour and this is where the immigrant comes in.

The labour market is unpredictable which is why Canada's immigration system should accept and reject immigrant applications based on current labour market needs, not projected ones. This is why I support the changes the Conservative government made to the immigration act. It will give the immigration minister the power to accept or reject applications on a whim. This is needed. There is no point in allowing the continued inflow of IT specialists when there will be little chance for that individual to find work in that field.

Wednesday, 23 April 2008

I don't update this blog as often as I wish simply because I hate blogging. However, Canada is my country and my only country and as a Canadian it is my fundamental human right to influence how this country is governed. And I think there is a need to bring the immigration issue to the forefront of the Canadian psyche because, for me, immigration is a sovereignty issue. Almost 20% of the Canadian population is foreign born yet ethnic lobby groups, upset at the Conservative government's reforms to the immigration act, may succeed at pressuring the Liberal party into defeating the government over the immigration reforms and force a general election, an election the host majority of the population do not want. If the immigrant population of Canada, a foreign born population and a minority of the whole populace, wields as much political power over the Liberal party to defeat a government they do not like then what does this say about the political future of Canada? What does this say about Canadian sovereignty when Canada loses legal control over its borders due to the influence of a minority segment of the population who wants an open border and an ever increasing and steady flow of foreign born individuals into the country? I guess what I am trying to say is that Canadians are losing control of their country. To me this is as much a concern as the influence multinational corporations have over world governments. Indeed, Canada's immigration system has been allowed to run amok because it has the business community's blessing. Anyhow I am just rambling.

So, again, I encourage you to regularly visit my links. NotCanada.com has updated and there are lots of good things to check out there. Also check out the weekly bulletins at Immigration Watch Canada. That site provides greater analysis of the immigration issue then I do. Also, do not shy away at my non-Canadian links. Immigration Watch International is Australian based but the site concentrates on global immigration issues, as the title of the cite implies. Also, keep in mind what is happening abroad in other immigrant receiving nations is most likely happening here.

You will also want to inform yourself about Canada's Human Rights Commissions. These institutions have become enemies to free speech and have to be stopped. Visit Ezra Levant and Free Mark Steyn! to keep yourself informed.

Tuesday, 22 April 2008

Our immigration system is broken. Fixing it should be a bipartisan affairRudyard Griffiths, National Post Published: Monday, April 21, 2008

As Stephane Dion weighs the pros and cons of triggering a federal election over the Conservatives' proposed changes to the powers of the Immigration Minister, he would do well to reflect on one simple fact: 40% of skilled and professional male immigrants leave Canada permanently within 10 years.

But do their families stay in the land of subsidized health care and higher education as these men live, work, and pay taxes overseas?

This statistic, garnered from an exhaustive government study conducted earlier this decade, represents a searing indictment of our immigration system. It suggests that contrary to being an immigration success story, Canada's selection process and settlement policies for newcomers are failing the country and recent immigrants alike, and imperilling our shared future.

The culprit here is the supposedly impartial point system that Canada uses to select immigrants. Adopted in 1967, the point system introduced the meritocratic idea that immigration to Canada should be colour-blind when it comes to the region and ethnicity of applicants. However, starting in late 1980s, a new set of biases began to creep into the point system. Whether it was the result of the management-school mania for fostering "knowledge-based" societies, or a class bias on the part of bureaucrats, the point system has been successively tweaked over the last two decades to favour newcomers with advanced degrees and high-level professional credentials.

I go so far as to suggest some countries receive favoured nation status. Read here and here for a further explanation.

The fundamental problem with an immigration system that selects for highly skilled and educated newcomers is that these individuals are chronically underemployed. They find it difficult, if not impossible, to get their foreign degrees or certifications recognized by Canadian institutions and professional groups. They also often have to master a new language and all must compete with Canadian born "white-collar" counterparts who have had the advantages of a lifetime of access to first-world education systems.

Given the economic hurdles that face the ever greater portion of highly skilled and educated newcomers who arrive in Canada each year, it is not surprising that poverty rates among newcomers have shot up over the last two decades.

It's what I have been saying all along.

The points system is not the main culprit. I argue Canada accepts more immigrants than it can handle. If we are to start somewhere to fix the immigration system it should be with the number of immigrants Canada receives each year. Canada should also reform the family class stream. Too many unskilled relatives of working age get into Canada via this stream. Also too many aged relatives, individuals who serve no real benefits to Canadian society but draw on tax payer subsidized services, also get into the country via the family class stream. Here is an eye opening figure from the linked article:

the admittance rate for the parents and grandparents of new arrivals is up some 200% from 2005 to 2006.

MONTREAL–Canada's spy agency has been forced to junk its approach to terrorist financing as clandestine groups both here and abroad learn to skirt the law-enforcement initiatives set up after Sept. 11, 2001.

Intelligence assessments obtained by The Canadian Press suggest officials have been operating in the dark when it comes to tracking funds earmarked for terrorism.

Canada's ability to trace money has been taken to task by the Financial Action Task Force, an international body that deals with threats to financial systems.

In a February report, the group found "serious issues" with the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada, or Fintrac, the federal body that traces illicit cash transfers.

[...]

Charities are a particular area of concern for Canadian investigators, who note that legitimately raised funds can end up financing terrorist activities.

[...]

While government officials disguised the scope of the problem, the Financial Action Task Force report said charities figure in more than a third of Fintrac disclosures related to suspected terrorist financing.

Thanks to Canada's lax refugee laws Canada has the dubious, and embarrassing, honour of being the most important financial base for the LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam). What makes this all the more embarrassing is that Canada has given Canadian citizenship to these people. This is an outrage!

Terrorist group used accounts: court orderStewart Bell in Toronto and Graeme Hamilton in Montreal, National Post Published: Tuesday, April 15, 2008

A Montreal building and several bank accounts in Ontario and Quebec were seized by police because they were deemed to be the property of a terrorist group, according to Federal Court documents unsealed yesterday.

The court orders explain why RCMP counterterrorism officers began shutting down the operations of the World Tamil Movement in Montreal and Toronto late last week, using powers granted to them under the Anti-Terror-ism Act.

The police action was carried out in secrecy, but yesterday Justice Francois Lemieux unsealed the court orders approving the seizures. The judge found there were reasonable grounds to believe the building and accounts were property "owned or controlled by, or on behalf of, a terrorist group."

The WTM is a non-profit organization run by Canadians of ethnic Tamil heritage, but the group's Quebec and Ontario branches are currently under police investigation for allegedly raising money for Sri Lanka's Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam guerrillas.

This isnt't the first time WTM offices were raided. In 2006 WTM offices were raided in Montreal by the RCMP, soon after the LTTE was recognized as a terrorist organization by the Conservative government.

Just to remind you, the Liberal party of Canada refused to list the LTTE as a terrorist organization even though every civilized country in the western world did. During this time it allowed the LTTE, a terrorist organization organized and run by thugs that uses child soldiers and pioneered the fine art of suicide bombing, to abuse the refugee system and raise funds on Canadian soil to wage a civil war in Sri Lanka. In effect they brought that civil war here, using Canada as a base for fund raising. The Liberal's allowed this becuase an estimated 6-10 federal ridings can be decided by expat Sri Lankan Tamil bloc votes. Votes before principles I suppose.

We need to accurately report these things. A Canadian was not raising funds for the Tamil Tigers. A Sri Lankan Tamil with Canadian citizenship was, who probably got his citizenship with a bogus refugee claim, like most in the expat Sri Lankan Tamil community. What's all the more unnerving is if Canada gave citizenship to this guy you have to wonder how many more people like him we gave our citizenship to. By doing so we only cheapen the value of our citizenship.

The RCMP says an Ontario man who was scheduled to appear in a Vancouver courtroom this morning to face Canada's first terrorism financing charge was collecting money for Sri Lanka's Tamil Tigers.

Prapaharan Thambithurai is accused of collecting money from ethnic Tamils in B.C.'s Lower Mainland that was destined for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam, or LTTE, a foreign terrorist organization under Canadian law.

A senior B.C. counter-terrorism officer said Mr. Thambithurai, aka "Prapa," was soliciting donations for the World Tamil Movement (WTM), which police say is the leading Tamil Tigers front organization in Canada.

[...]

But many Canadian Tamils are at least sympathetic to the Tigers, who have been fighting a long-standing guerrilla war against the Sri Lankan government for a separate state for the country's ethnic Tamil minority.

Canada is home to the world's largest expatriate Sri Lankan Tamil community, and the RCMP and Canadian Security Intelligence Service have long alleged that front organizations based in Toronto have been secretly sending money to the Tigers to help them buy weapons.

There is a reason why Canada has the largest Sri Lankan Tamil community in the world outside of Sri Lanka even though the Indian state of Tamil Nadu is geographically closer and the more culturally similar to Sri Lanka. It has to do with Canada's lax refugee laws. Most Sri Lankan Tamils, I allege, are economic migrants conning the laxest refugee system in the entire world much the same way grifters con an easy mark. Why go to India when you can go to Canada? The abuse of our refugee system by Sri Lankan Tamils illustrates what is wrong with our refugee system and why it needs to be fixed. I've blogged about it enough and you can my reasons as to why Canada should stop accepting Sri Lankan Tamil refugees here.

The World Tamil Movement is considered by police to be the main LTTE front organization in the country. Ottawa has been trying to deport the group's former coordinator, Manickavasagam Suresh, alleging he sent money to the Tigers to buy military equipment.

[...]

The Tamil Tigers are one of the world's leading proponents of suicide bombings and are the only terrorist group to have successfully assassinated two world leaders, including India's Rajiv Gandhi.

OTTAWA — A majority of Canadians say their country bends too much in trying to make visible minorities feel at home, even as voters pat themselves on the back for being a welcoming society.

Results of a new survey for The Globe and Mail/CTV News also show substantial national fault lines on immigration, with urban Canadians more likely to support the growth of visible minority groups than their rural cousins are.

If we take into account the fact that Canada's major urban centres are where the vast majority of immigrants and visible minorities reside then these figures make sense. For instance half the population of the city of Toronto are immigrants, a figure that is compounded if we include their Canadian born children. Also, almost half the population of the city of Toronto (around 47% I believe) are visible minorities, soon to form the majority in the not too distant future. It should be of no wonder, then, that Toronto would be the most "welcoming" to immigrants and champion the growth of the visible minority population.

Therefore the consensus of the "rural" component, I argue, is a more accurate gauge of the true sentiments of Canadians and I feel the majority of Canadians are opposed to the ethnic and cultural transformation of their country into something alien and foreign via mass immigration and state sanctioned multiculturalism. This is rarely given any consideration in the news media because many of the journalists, who have saddled themselves with a type of "white man's burden" to educate us of the unenlightened and childlike masses, live and work in Toronto, and other urban centres, and prescribe the social renegenieering that is going on in that city to the rest of the country not because it is the right thing to do but simple because they happen to want it that way. It's the view of the minority masquerading as the vox populi.

According to the poll, 61 per cent of those surveyed believe that Canada makes too many accommodations for visible minorities. In Quebec, 72 per cent of those surveyed feel that way.

[...]

The poll also found that 45 per cent of those surveyed believe new Canadians hold on to their customs and traditions for too long, only two percentage points below those who feel newcomers integrate into Canadian life at a natural and acceptable pace.

[...]

For example, on the matter of whether accepting new immigrants of diverse ethnic and religious backgrounds is an enriching part of the Canadian identity, 65 per cent living in cities of more than one million agreed, compared with 53 per cent of Canadians in communities of fewer than 30,000.

Such a question is irrelevant given the greater issues at stake regarding mass immigration and is included to force a positive spin on an otherwise negative situation. Of course people are going to reply positively but doing so doesn't mean we should continue on the current path Canada's immigration policy is following. Sure, one may find it enriching but is it still a good thing when the ethnic and cultural make up of Canada is altered in an unrecognizable fashion? Does the host majority feel comfortable being rendered a minority in their own country? Is it still enriching when wages are stagnated and good jobs are made harder to get because of mass immigration?

When asked to characterize the fact that five million Canadians are visible minorities, 55 per cent of Liberal supporters said it was a positive development, compared with 38 per cent of Conservative backers.

By contrast, 53 per cent of NDP backers, 56 per cent of Bloc Québécois backers and 59 per cent of Greens found the numbers a good thing.

Even though such news was received with great fan fare in the news media it has never been explained why this is a good thing. And so I am going to ask the question. Why is the growth of the visible minority population in Canada a good thing?

I am surprised to find the numbers as low as they are. I would assume at least 60% of Liberal supporters would receive such news as a positive development. I also suspect that many of the respondents answered in the way they feel they were expected to respond and not how they sincerely felt.

Saturday, 12 April 2008

Canada's immigration system is immigration for immigration's sake and because of it we are creating ghettos of poverty in Canada's major cities - poverty that wouldn't exist were it not for immigration - that are increasingly becoming characterized by race, ethnicity, and religion. One example is the Muslim community showcased in thisToronto Star.

WAR ON POVERTY: RISE OF THE MUSLIM GHETTOFor Muslim poor, a shameful admission

Apr 12, 2008 04:30 AMNoor JavedStaff Reporter

The exact number of Muslims in Toronto who live below Statistics Canada's low-income cut-off, the country's unofficial poverty line, is difficult to determine, as socio-economic data is rarely gathered through the lens of religion.

[...]

"Already we can see the formation of ghettos in some parts of the city," said Shakir, referring to neighbourhoods where overt race-based poverty is glaringly obvious, and where halal meat stores are in abundance.

The scant data available paints a troubling picture of a growing community of nearly 300,000 Muslims, which includes a mix of refugees, recent immigrants, and those who settled in Canada decades ago.

The four poorest of all ethno-racial groups, with more than 50 per cent of their members living below Statistics Canada's low-income cut-off, were Somalis, Afghans, Ethiopians and Bangladeshi populations – all from predominately Muslim countries. At least 30 per cent of Pakistanis and West Asians also qualified as poor, according to a study done by the Institute for Social Research at York University in 2006, which looked at the demographic and social profiles of ethno-racial groups in the city.

[...]

In 13 neighbourhoods deemed "at-risk" in Toronto by United Way, more than half have significant Muslim populations, including Flemingdon Park, Regent Park, Etobicoke North and Jane-Finch. "Every year, we see more and more poor people coming to the mosque for help," said Omar Farouk, president of the International Muslims Organization, based in Etobicoke, which has opened a food bank and distributes food to shelters once a month. More than 200 people regularly access the food bank.

[...]

"It's not about settlement; it's about systemic barriers in the system. We are receiving well-educated people. They are ... engineers and doctors, but they are still doing dishes, or driving cabs."

But many don't even get those menial jobs. In a 2005 Canadian Labour Congress study on Racial Status and Employment Incomes, Arab and West-Asian visible minorities had the highest overall unemployment rate at 14 per cent.There are internal barriers within the community too. There is an obvious divide between the haves and have-nots, the second-generation Muslims and the new arrivals who have little interaction with each other outside of "Friday prayers at the mosque."

Note how the immigration system needs to be protected at all costs even though the immigration system is the root of the problem. We are told, as is usual, that the problem is systemic in some fashion particularly when it comes to employment. But if there is a looming skilled labour shortage, and considering the competitive nature of the business community, then why are businesses comfortable with making a pass at immigrant engineers? It is the usual "Canada has failed these immigrants" angle when in reality it is the immigration system that has failed these immigrants and Canadians, a reality we would see if we just took our heads out of the desert sand that is Toronto, Vancouver, the Toronto Star, the Globe and Mail, the CBC, etc.

Much of this poverty can be explained if we allow ourselves to consider the possibility that perhaps Canada is importing too many immigrants. The reason why immigrant engineers are driving cabs or doing dishes instead of working in their field of expertise is that Canadian businesses didn't need them in the first place. Also, too many economic migrants posing as refugees are entering the country as well. No relevant job skills or language skills are needed to enter Canada via the refugee stream. The family reunification stream is also a problem for the same reasons.

These growing pockets of poverty could have been avoided, or at least curtailed, if Canada had a constructive immigration system. But since we don't Canada is creating unnecessary and avoidable poverty levels that are increasingly taking on an ethnic, racial, and religious character. Since this is the case it is too easy to blame "systemic discrimination" or "racism" as the reason when in fact a mass immigration system directed more so by ideological commitment and political opportunism than by economic need is the cause. We should never lose sight of the fact that Canada's immigration system exists to serve the needs of Canada and Canadians and not non citizens living in foreign nations yet this seems to be the case now that Canada's immigration has become more of a charity than a policy.

Growing pockets of Muslim poverty warrants special concern. Muslims and poverty is a potent mix because of radical Islam. The concern is heightened when one considers the "victim status" Muslims have given themselves. If you are wondering where I am going with this then think Paris, 2005.

Thursday, 10 April 2008

I haven't blogged on the changes to the immigration act the Conservatives initiated, oddly enough, but I will say that from what I have read they are doing the right thing. We know this because it seems to have all those groups and so-called "stake holders" afraid; those who have been feeding at the trough of the immigration industry and has allowed our immigration system to evolve into some Frankenstein monster where we, as a people of a sovereign nation, have lost control of our borders. Because of this immigration is a sovereignty issue much like foreign ownership of the Canadian economy, NAFTA, and a common currency, are sovereignty issues.

One of the so called "stake holders" are immigration consultants. They are an unlicensed, oftentimes unscrupulous, and still largely unregulated body of alleged professionals whose sole product of sale is Canadian citizenship. They regularly advise their clients on how to abuse the immigration system and to make fake refugee claims when all else fails which is met with the willing participation of the immigrant. Since the Conservative government has made initiatives to fix Canada's mess of a system they should maintain the momentum and go after immigration consultants. Here is a Toronto Star article that exposes some problems that plague the immigration consultancy profession.

Immigration watchdog needs clout, panel told

Call for fledgling consultants' group to be scrapped or given more teeth to tackle dishonest advisersApr 10, 2008 04:30 AMJim RankinStaff Reporter

The fledgling Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants should be scrapped or laws changed to give it, or another oversight body, teeth to go after unscrupulous and unregistered advisers, a travelling parliamentary committee was told yesterday.

[...]

The society, set up as a corporation four years ago, has faced dissent by members and former board members over how it has been run, and, despite several attempts, has been unable to hold an annual meeting due to lack of a quorum.

We learn that this regulatory body was set up four years ago. This means that up to that point the immigration consultant "profession" has been operating without any form of checks and balances, no laws, and no punitive system for unethical conduct. To the point, it was out of control and apparently still operates that way as the new corporation lacks any clout with some calling for its dismemberment.

In Lost in Migration, a 2007 Star investigative series into the immigration consulting industry, the newspaper found the regulatory model set up with the blessing of Citizenship and Immigration Canada, has no ability to go after "ghosts" – non-member consultants, who continue to charge fees and offer unofficial immigration assistance, both in Canada and abroad.

While there are 1,277 consultants registered to represent clients before the Canadian immigration department – many offering much-needed help navigating the country's sometimes complicated immigration system – the number of ghosts is much larger and difficult to pin down, particularly abroad.

Malcolm Heins, chief executive officer of the Law Society of Upper Canada, which recently began overseeing Ontario's 2,000 paralegals, told the committee the government should scrap the model and start over, with a legislated statute that could be used to go after anyone offering immigration help without proper certification.

The problem with immigration consultancy is that anybody can be one without any certification or license whatsoever. This is why there are more "ghosts" than there are registered members. That's why unethical conduct plagues the "profession." The government needs to step in and regulate them via legislature and overseen by an impartial watchdog. Canadian citizenship is a public trust in desperate need of safe guarding. Since Canada's immigration system has turned into an industry, where Canadian citizenship is the product being bought and sold in some fashion, Canadian citizenship has been devalued with much thanks directed at immigration consultants. Immigration consultants need to be regulated and licensed. Anyone operation without one should be fined and/or jailed. Any consultant who has been found to act unethically and not in the interests of Canadians would lose their license and livelihood. Any immigrant who sought the advice of an unregulated and unlicensed consultant should be turned away and told to find one who does. This way the unlicensed consultant would lose business and thus purge the "profession" of unscrupulous individuals via market forces. These measures are needed to fix the mess and estrange Canadian citizenship from the mere product it has become.

Immigration is a sovereignty issue. Those who have the potential to undermine that need government regulation. This is our country and it is possible to lose it.

Opposition parties are raising their voices against the recent immigration changes initiated by the Conservatives and then refuse to defeat it in a hypocritical fashion befitting anyone who calls him or herself a Liberal. One such voice is Liberal MP Dr. Ruby Dhalla (Brampton—Springdale). Here is an article in the Toronto Star that illustrates this.

OTTAWA–Canada's immigration system is being made vulnerable to potential racism about who gets to stay in the country, opposition critics say.

Despite these warnings, the Conservative government's proposed changes to immigration cleared an NDP challenge in the House of Commons last night, when all Liberals in attendance avoided casting protest votes that could have provoked a snap election.

[..]

Liberal MP Ruby Dhalla suggested the Tories would be more friendly to potential immigrants from ethnic communities they are trying to court for political reasons.

"I think they're really picking and choosing for political purposes which communities they want to work with, and that is why there is a fear among these communities that the immigration laws being proposed right now are going to have an impact on them," Dhalla (Brampton-Springdale) told reporters.

Her comments are disingenuous because the Liberal party has been playing this game for decades and I am certain she is well aware of it. Indeed, the South Asian community that she represents, particularly Sikh, have been prime benefactors of Liberal largesse when it comes to immigration. The following are quotes from an article I blogged about in an earlier thread you can read here.

Bogus "nannies" are among many fraudsters seeking entry into Canada through a $25-million immigration office in India that was opened in 2004 for political reasons, according to newly released internal documents.

"Fraud is omnipresent in [the Indian town of ] Chandigarh and is found in every sort of document, Indian and Canadian," according to the Canadian diplomatic mission's 2006-07 annual report obtained by Vancouver lawyer Richard Kurland.

[...]

Mr. Kurland said the documents prove bureaucrats were correct and the politicians, anxious to reward Punjabi-Canadian Liberal supporters clamouring for better immigration services, were wrong to open the mission.

Canada has the only diplomatic mission in the city, so there are no suitable schools for children, and few opportunities to socialize.

The Punjab region of India is home to most of India's Sikhs as is a significant percentage of the South Asian community in Brampton-Springdale and their votes played a significant role in getting Ms. Dhalla elected, herself being of South Asian heritage. Why is she expressing concern now that Canada's immigration system may be subjected to alleged ethnic favourtism when this has been going on for years under Liberal party tutelage and it is becuase of ethnic favourtism, and the Liberal party penchant for "picking and choosing for political purposes which communities they want to work with", that has benefited South Asian, particularly Sikh immigration, in the first place?

LONDON — Air Canada flights to Toronto and Montreal were targets of a well-advanced terrorist plot to blow up at least seven jetliners simultaneously over the Atlantic using bombs stored in drink bottles and assembled aboard the aircraft, according to claims by British prosecutors.

In August, 2006, a group of 19 British men were arrested in London with a bomb laboratory that had the tools to construct the components of liquid-chemical bombs that would be difficult for airport security to detect, stored in Lucozade drink containers with electronic detonators. Eight of those men, including the alleged ringleaders, are on trial this week.

Charges have been dropped against some of the 19, and others are still in the judicial system.

[...]

The Canadian dimension of the plot only became public yesterday, when a judge revealed to potential jurors in the trial of the eight men that Canadian flights were allegedly targeted.

[...]

Canadian officials confirmed yesterday that Air Canada flights were among the potential targets, which also included flights to the United States. They said that the plot had involved targeting a number of flights on the same day.

Still think Muslim immigration is a good thing? If these terrorists could get into Britain then they can get into Canada. And if they are "home grown" terrorists then all the more reason to ban Muslim immigration altogether. If Islam, even in an advanced, civilized, pluralistic environment like the United Kingdom is producing terrorists then what does it say about that religion? I'm sorry but it may very well be in the interests of Canadians and their safety that Muslim immigration to Canada be curtailed outright. Islam has failed to police itself and weed out its dangerous fanatics allowing these people, it seems, to operate without harassment within the Muslim community. That being the case then discriminating based on religion and country of origin is justified. Not all immigration is good immigration.

OTTAWA – For the first time in Canada's history, visible minorities have surpassed the five million mark as a new wave of immigrants from Asia is changing the face of Canada at a staggering rate, according to new census data released Wednesday by Statistics Canada.

Visible minorities now comprise more than 16 per cent of the total population as their number skyrocketed by 27 per cent between 2001 and 2006, more than five times the previous increase of 5.4 per cent.

The sharp growth in the visible minority population was largely due to the fact that three-quarters of new immigrants to Canada since 2001 were visible minorities, analysts said.

South Asians, those who hail from such countries as India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, now slightly outnumber the Chinese, who were identified as the top visible minority group in 2001, the last time the census was taken.

Nearly 1.3 million people identified themselves as South Asian in the 2006 census – a 38 per cent jump over 2001.

South Asians now account for a quarter of all visible minorities in Canada, or four per cent of the total population. Those with roots in China comprise about another quarter of the country's visible minority population, with some 1.2 million identifying themselves as Chinese.

So half of the visible minority population in Canada is either South Asian or Chinese. That's quite an accomplishment in such a short time for countries who immigration to Canada didn't really start until the mid 1970s and later.

India is Canada's top source country for immigrants as of 2007. Before that it was China. Landed South Asian immigrants (which includes India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka) now outnumber landed Chinese immigrants. The question I ask is why are there so many South Asian and Chinese immigrants in Canada in the first place? If Canada's points system for immigration is colour neutral in practice then why does it seem to benefit immigrants from some countries more so than immigrants from others? Why is the face of diversity in multicultural Toronto usually flooded with South Asian and Chinese faces. Where are the others? You'd figure there would be a broad spectrum of immigrants coming into Canada but in reality that is not the case. The vast majority of immigrants to Canada today come from one region of the world: Asia.

Though Canadian immigration gives the appearance of a colour blind entry system in reality that is not true becuase the points system is not applied equally to all regions and countries. The points system may be colour neutral but it is not politically neutral and has been manipulated to favour immigrants from certain countries. Canada's immigration system once favoured European immigration but now it favours South Asian and Chinese immigration and the result is the same: colonization.

When Jagdev Hansra and his wife Preetinder moved to Brampton from Punjab last July, they were unsure of what to expect. They had heard how difficult life was in Canada, about the cold weather and about the pitfalls of being so far from home.

Except that in Brampton, it looked a lot like home.

Instead of being part of a minority, they are part of what is a growing visible "majority" in some GTA suburbs. In the past five years, Brampton has seen the greatest change, with the percentage of visible minorities increasing from 40 to 57 – most being South Asians.

"It made it easier for us to settle," said Preetinder, who works in an auto-parts factory that employs mostly Punjabis.

Notice how they moved from the Punjab, a region in India, to Brampton, which has become a de facto Indian colony. Such a move illustrates that they have no desire to integrate and assimilate into Canadian society opting instead to shelter themselves in the Indian colony of Brampton, a choice made by most immigrants to this country because they want to live amongst their own.

For the first time, the combined total of those from India, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Sri Lanka outnumbered the Chinese. There were 1.26 million South Asians, followed by 1.21 million Chinese and 784,000 blacks across the country.

In Toronto, nearly half of the population, at 46.9 per cent, were a visible minority. Markham topped the list of communities in the GTA with just over 65 per cent visible minorities.

South Asians are often looking for a way out of political instability, said immigration consultant Ali Naqvi. But he said many come because they want to give their children a better life.

Every time a South Asian immigrant tells you that you better have a shovel ready because you'll soon find yourself waist deep in BS. I have yet to meet an Indian immigrant who didn't live the good life back in their home country of India and in fact it is not wrong to assume that almost all immigration from South Asia is middle class or upper caste immigration. It costs money to move to Canada and they are the ones who have it.

"Everyone struggles," he said. "That is part of the settlement process for newcomers. The hope is that the sacrifice translates into success."

That's what the Hansras are counting on as they settle in their new homeland.

"You think you will find a job, make a lot of money, but it's not so simple," said Preetinder, 27.

Her job of sorting through the nuts and bolts at the auto parts factory is hard on her eyes. "I never imagined things would be so difficult here," she said.

Jagdev, 26, who recently got his trucking licence, is more optimistic. "At least you can get a job here. In India you can't."

Note how they were allowed to immigrate to fill no job in particular which illustrates how poorly our immigration system is at meeting realistic job needs. Their immigration to Canada was immigration for its own sake. Secondly, note the unrealistic expectations they had before they arrived in Canada. They expected, the wife at least, to make a lot of money. This illustrates the upper caste greed that is driving South Asian immigration to Canada where economic realities are ignored to favour materialist fantasies. But South Asian ambitions are not restricted to having "a better life."

"While South Asians are the majority in terms of numbers, in terms of influence they are not," he said.

Ratna Omidvar, executive director of Maytree Foundation, which funds many immigrant and refugee programs, also sees discrepancies in the reflection of visible minorities in positions of influence.

"Public institutions are a mirror of the society. They reflect the power structure of the society and you see the faces represented in power and privileges," Omidvar said.

How is South Asian immigration not another form of colonialism? I say it is and it is exemplary of the problem of selecting immigrants from one country or region of the world in large numbers. There is no real reason for Canada to be accepting large numbers of immigrants from South Asia aside from political ones and this has resulted in the transformation of the Canadian city of Brampton into a near functioning Indian colony. South Asian immigrants have expressed desires for political power and influence and in due time Brampton politics will be South Asian in character. It will become a town of South Asians, run by South Asians, for South Asians not unlike Quebec for Quebecers, England for the English, and the Hindutva. Is nothing learned from Apna Town?

The problem inherent in such an event is that is discourages assimilation and integration into Canadian society. Secondly, it begs us to ask if immigrants really care to integrate at all or do they come to live in Canada in a parasitic fashion while sheltering themselves from Canadian influences in their ethnic enclaves? Thirdly, as these ethnically specific towns begin to pocket the land, will this be a problem for political stability? For instances, what's preventing a future South Asian exclusive town like Brampton from declaring independence and aligning itself with India? How many Quebec's does this country need? We also need to ask if Canadians are comfortable with parts of their country being transformed to reflect the homelands of the immigrants who clustered there? How is a Canadian uniqueness cultivated when portions of the country look like foreign countries? It is said Canadian culture is hindered by American culture. How is it helped by Indian culture, or any other culture for that matter?

The purpose of this post is to bring to light the colonial character of mass immigration. This kind of behviour is not exclusive to South Asian but can be seen in Chinese immigration and Italian immigration like in the town of Woodbridge, ON where half the population is Italian. If mass immigration has fated Canada to a future of ethnic enclaves, colonies, and identity politics then it needs to be reformed. This is Canada and it's the only country I have. Unlike some, both of my feet are planted here. When my country is gone then what do I have?

It appears Canada's legal body is expressing concern over the Conservative government's recent changes to the Immigration Act which invariably means they are concerned about their incomes (these are lawyers we are talking about). They don't care about human rights or what happens to immigrants when they arrive in Canada or the effects of mass immigration on the economy, Canadians' incomes, or Canadian society. All they care about is a steady and ever expanding stream of clients to keep their practices afloat and the money, the immigrant's money, coming in. It's all about money which is why immigration lawyers have been hard at work making Canadian immigration laws as lax and abusable as possible while lobbying for increasing immigration intake numbers because they directly benefited from it financially. The result has been a cheapening of Canadian citizenship, a perpetual backlog that has ballooned to 900,000 applicants, refugee fraud buoyed by an endless appeal process at tax payer expense, the colonization of Canadian neighbourhoods, and an industry built around the Immigration act that is estimated to cost Canadian tax payers billions of dollars annually.

OTTAWA–Canada's immigration system risks being dictated by "ministerial fiat" rather than transparent regulations under a sweeping new law proposed by the federal government, a legal group warns.

While the Tory goal of reducing the backlog of would-be-immigrants is "laudable," Immigration Minister Diane Finley hasn't made the case why her dramatic reforms of the immigration system are the right solution, said Alex Stojicevic, chair of the immigration section of the Canadian Bar Association.

"We fail to see why these are necessary to achieve the government's aims," he said, calling the existing system relatively transparent and objective.

Under the proposal, Finley would have the power to issue "instructions" to her department to give priority to immigrants whose job skills are in demand in Canada. At the same time, she would have the power to refuse applications in other categories.

But Stojicevic suggested the reforms risk putting too much power in the hands of department officials.

"She wants to bring some sanity to these processing backlogs. She wants to try to address, where she can, economic priorities. We just don't see this change as necessary to accomplish that goal," he said.

Oh cry me a river! If Canada had a sane immigration system in the first place then the Tories wouldn't need to make the changes. Lawyer greed feeding at the trough has created a monster of a mess of an immigration system that was in sore need of a clean up twenty years ago. The Tories are doing the right thing. Besides, if they didn't do then who would. The Liberals?

Here is an article wherein a coalition of immigrant and refugee advocates warns the Liberal Party that it risks a backlash from the immigrant vote if it does not stop the new immigration proposals initiated by the Conservative government. Yeah right! Who are the going to vote for? The NDP? If immigrants are going to boycott the Liberals over their failure to stop the immigration reforms then I guess they have no choice but to vote for...the Liberals?

LONDON – Record levels of immigration to Britain have brought little or no economic benefit, a House of Lords report published Tuesday said, disputing the government's claims that immigration is good for the economy.

The Economic Affairs Committee called for new limits on the number of people allowed to enter Britain, where immigration has grown at an unprecedented rate in recent years.

[...]

"Looking to the future, if you have got that increase in numbers and you haven't got any economic benefit from it, you have got to ask yourself: Is this a wise thing to do?" said the committee's chairman, Lord John Wakeham.

[...]

The government, however, says immigrants' contributions to Britain have been positive. The Home Office says they help power Britain's economy, contributing $12 billion in 2006, according to the latest figures.

The government may correctly claim that immigrants contributed $12 billion to Britain's economy in 2006 but absent the costs of supporting an immigration system that figure doesn't mean much. If immigrants contributed $12 billion to Britain's economy but it cost $13 billion to bring them here you can see how that first figure now means nothing but in fact reveals how hurtful the immigration system is and I gather this is what the House of Lord's report is saying. It stated that immigration to Britain is bringing little or no economic benefit to the nation and needs to be reexamined and Canada needs to do the same. Our country is not dissimilar to the United Kingdom regarding immigration matters. We attract the same people from the same countries at almost the same levels per capita (Canada accepts more in this aspect the highest in the world in fact). However to this date Canada has not published the costs of running it's immigration system so estimates have to suffice and those numbers are in the billions of dollars. If it is true that mass immigration to Britain has not netted the economic gains it was supposed to then assuming that that tale is playing here in Canada would not be far fetched.

The House of Lords report suggests reforming the system by reducing Britain's immigrant intake and curtailing the family sponsorship program. I agree and Canada should do the same.

Federal opposition parties are stepping up their criticism of a contentious overhaul of Canada's immigration system, accusing the Tories of trying to implement 20-year-old Reform party policies.

Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion yesterday cited the 1988 election platform of the Reform party, a precursor of the Conservatives, that said "immigration should be essentially economic in nature."

"Immigrants should possess the human capital necessary to adjust quickly and independently to the needs of Canadian society and the job market," said the Reform document distributed by the Liberals.

It says that immigration should not be designed to "radically or suddenly alter the ethnic makeup of Canada, as it increasingly seems to be."

Yesterday, Dion said those policies are the motivation behind sweeping proposals to allow the government to give priority to immigrants it deems desirable, such as workers whose skills are in demand, while refusing applications from other categories of immigrants.

Can somebody tell me what is wrong with that 1988 Reform party policy? Seriously! I guarantee if Canadians were polled the majority of respondents would support it. Why? Because it makes sense!

Should Immigrants be selected based on their capacity "to adjust quickly and independently to the needs of Canadian society and the job market"? Heaven forfend! That the ethnic makeup should not be disturbed by immigration? Goodness gracious NO!

The reason why immigration should not disrupt the ethnic or racial make up of a country, as it is doing to Canada, is that nobody wants to be an ethnic or racial minority including minorities in Canada which is why they overwhelmingly support mass immigration of their people into Canada. It's about race so why should Canadians be harangued for desiring to keep Canada majority white? What's wrong with that? I argue that keeping Canada majority white is sound for the sake of curbing racism and discrimination.

As for immigrants possessing pertinent job skills well that's self evident but it seems the Liberals are all for the mass importation of unskilled people which is strange considering all the talk about looming skills shortages. So who does Canada's immigration policy really serve? Canadians? Not likely.

It is in the power of the Liberal party to defeat the government over this and force an election but they won't do it which goes to show how serious they are about the issue. If an election were called it is will most likely end with another Conservative minority and signal the end of Dion's political aspirations. You see politics is more about getting elected and less about governing. For this reason the Liberal party, and the NDP as well, have been supporting and adding to Canada's monster of a mess immigration system. It delivers them votes. As for the problems it creates, let Canadians deal with it and pay for it too.

The high drop rate for some immigrant groups has prompted action to address this issue. This, of course, means more money is going to be needed. Just add it to the billions of tax payer dollars already spent on the immigration industry.

Trustee Josh Matlow will propose today at a committee meeting that the board do all it can to help students at high risk of dropping out, including those who speak Portuguese (42.5 per cent drop out rate), Spanish (39.1 per cent), Somali (36.7), Vietnamese (24.6), Persian/Farsi (30.6) and Arabic (27.8).

The motion comes as board staff work on a master plan to boost the learning of all groups at risk, as well as a blueprint for an Africentric school to open in the fall of 2009 in a bid to lower the 40 per cent dropout rate among black students.

There has been no call from either Toronto's Portuguese or Spanish parents for such a culturally focused school, possibly because "we've been so insular within our own population, we need to turn outwards and engage with the larger community," says Marcie Ponte, director of Working Women Community Centre, which runs an after-school mentoring and tutoring program for Portuguese children.

[...]

Professor Lee Gunderson, another prominent researcher in immigrant learning from the University of British Columbia, says immigrant children can need up to nine years of English as a Second Language help, instead of the current five funded by many provincial governments. "With Canada clearly heading for more and more diversity – in some schools 99 per cent of students don't speak English as their first language – it's not possible to tailor programs to each particular group. You need teachers trained to work with the whole range," said Gunderson yesterday.

Get that? "Culturally focused schools" not too dissimilar from the proposed Afrocentric schools, a school needed because the black community has proven inept at raising their own kids so they blame society for their faults. I guess the high drop out rate for the other ethnic groups are Canada's fault too.

In any event what is becoming clear as more calls are made for "culturally focused schools" is that multiculturalism is failing and mass immigration is burdening our school systems. If the children of these immigrants cannot make it the "diverse classrooms" of Canadian schools then what does it say about "diversity" in our society? Diversity a strength? Doesn't seem like it. It appears diversity is dividing Canadian society but in true Orwellian fashion we call it integration. If diversity cannot work in the classroom then it is not working in society in general.

Tuesday, 1 April 2008

I read this article in the Toronto Star and it got me thinking. If Tibetans feel that India is a safe country to make an asylum claim then why is Canada processing refugee claims from the South Asian countries of India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. Here are some quotes from the article.

Between 2,500 and 3,000 Tibetans have entered India every year since the early 1990s, according to the Office of the Reception Centres in Dharamsala.[...]Since the failed Tibetan uprising against the Chinese government in 1959, almost 130,000 Tibetans have followed the Tibetan spiritual and political leader, the Dalai Lama, settling mostly in India but also in the United States, Canada and Switzerland.

[...]

Those who enter India say that China's claim about increasing economic opportunities hasn't really affected them. Still, coming to India isn't just about access to financial betterment. It's mostly about ties to language and religion that many say are easier to cultivate in India than in Tibet.

[...]

For men like Tashi, being in India is a real treat.

"This is a true democracy. Here you can do anything you want, there is no fear, no pressure, even if you want to protest," he said, referring to the demonstrations in the streets of Dharamsala.

According to this collection of StatsCan tables, dated 2001, on immigration figures Pakistan, India, and Sri Lanka are numbers 1,2, and 8 respectively on Canada's top ten list of refugee producing countries. Incidentally India and Pakistan are numbers 2 and 4 respectively on the list of top ten immigrant producing countries (India is now number 1 as of 2007) and 1 and 4 for family immigration with Sri Lanka taking the number 6 spot.

If Tibetans feel and vouch for India as a safe country to seek refuge then why are we accepting refugees from India? Why aren't Pakistanis making asylum claims there as well? Why is Canada home to the largest collection of Sri Lankan Tamils outside of Sri Lanka when the Indian state of Tamil Nadu is right across the street. Tamils are the ethnic majority of Tamil Nadu's population of 65 million people where Tamil is the predominant language. Why do Sri Lankan Tamils ignore the geographic proximity of Tamil Nadu and cultural similarity of that Indian State and travel half way around the world to a culturally dissimilar country that has no historic or cultural ties with Sri Lanka? Why do Pakistanis feel the same as well when India is home to a sizable Muslim minority and is ethnically and culturally similar? India is the world's largest democracy and is constitutionally pluralistic. It is safe enough to turn Indian, Pakistani, and Ski Lankan refugee claims away at the border and instruct them to make their claims in India.

Canada's refugee system is such a mess it invites abuse and most of this has to do with the nefarious Singh decision of 1985 when six Guyanese Sikhs challenged Canada's refugee laws and won. Economic migrants posing as refugees is disgusting and it needs to be stopped. This is like men dressing up like women to secure a spot on a life boat to flee the sinking Titanic. It's a scam thus it is no coincidence that not only are India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka on Canada's top ten list of refugee producing countries but are also on the top ten list for family immigration. The phony refugee claim is not made to solely benefit the claimant but the whole family which includes immediate and extended members. It's dishonourable, it's wrong, and we should put a stop to it.

Because of Canada's mess of a refugee system immigrant con men and women have no qualms to stoop so low to fake a refugee claim to get into the country. There are more Sri Lankan Tamils in Canada than there are in Tamil Nadu becuase Sri Lankan Tamils targeted Canada and abused our lax refugee system to scam their way to get themselves and their family members into a first world country. If Tamils were in such danger then why do they so eagerly return to their country of alleged persecution? Hint: it's becuase they're not real refugees.

Canada's refugee system should help those who really need our help, not shysters.